The GTX 780 overclocking champ

Last month, we took a look at EVGA’s GTX 780, which sported a new, fancy-britches “ACX” cooler. This month, it’s Asus’s turn with its own redesigned and totally non-reference GTX 780. At first glance, this GPU’s most notable attribute is its redesigned cooler, which despite many changes still bears the DirectCU II moniker we’ve seen on previous models. The new design uses five direct contact (DC) copper heat pipes, one of which is a plump 10mm, along with a primary “hybrid” fan that has two sets of fan blades to blow air in two directions at once. The cooler takes up two PCIe slots, and has an aluminum backplate wrapped around it to help support the cooler and dissipate heat across the top of the card. Our favorite feature of this cooler is that it can be detached from the card with just four screws, making it easy to clean before company comes over.

Note: This review was originally featured in the November 2013 issue of the magazine.

Size isn’t everything

It seems like every month brings a new liquid cooler to review. Sometimes this rapid pace creates unexpected side effects. Exhibit A: The Corsair H110, which is nearly identical to the NZXT Kraken X60 reviewed on page 81 of this issue. They don’t use the same fans, they don’t recommend the same fan orientation, and the H110 skips software-based controls, but the rest of it appears to be the same bits manufactured by Asetek. Corsair also charges a slight price premium that we’re not sure is justified.

Note: This review was originally featured in the September 2013 issue of the magazine.

Prodigal son returns... with Haswell and a 780M!

If the MSI GT60 looks familiar, that might be because it’s identical to our zero-point gaming notebook, which we first reviewed in our December 2012 issue. While the laptop uses the same chassis, the refreshed unit comes with shiny new parts that include Intel’s Haswell CPU and a new top-tier 700-series GPU from Nvidia.

Note: This review was originally featured in the September 2013 issue of the magazine.

Hard drives you can actually smack down

When it comes to your data, there are times when a USB key doesn't have the capacity or speed you need, and you can't afford to have a delicate hard drive smashing on the floor. Enter ruggedized USB 3.0 hard drives, which address all of our needs by combining speed and reliability into a supremely portable package. We put three such drives to the test, and found out which one has the speed you crave and the durability you require.

Note: This article was taken from the October 2013 issue of the magazine.

Give a little, take a little

We don’t know how it started, but heat spreaders on today’s RAM sticks have gotten kinda out of control. So, gearheads these days have to get pretty creative (or potentially destructive) to fit most large aftermarket CPU coolers on the motherboard. Thermaltake had the bright idea to just make a more compact cooler, with not one but two 120mm fans on it. NiC stands for “Non-Interference Cooling,” and its C5 model sits at the top of the vendor’s lineup. With five heat pipes and 230 watts of heat dissipation, it’s ready for serious cooling, and it won’t get in the way of your RAM slots.

Note: This review was originally featured in the October 2013 issue of the magazine.

A bit too extreme, as it turns out

Last month, we reviewed two GeForce GTX 770 cards from Asus and Gigabyte that cost just $10 more than the reference design, but were well-cooled and only slightly overclocked. That’s too boring for MSI, which decided to take its flagship GeForce GTX N770 Lightning to an extreme not previously seen.

Note: This review was originally featured in the October 2013 issue of the magazine.

Jack of all trades, master of none

What do you call a device that can be either a laptop or a tablet, or even a few additional novel form factors in between? A Lenovo ThinkPad Helix, that’s what—which, as the name implies, is a hybrid with a twist.

Note: This review was originally featured in the October 2013 issue of the magazine.

Finally, all SATA 6Gb/s on an Intel board!

Motherboard shopping used to be like buying a Model T—you could buy any color you wanted as long it was black. Today, we have a serious Nerd World problem in the dizzying array of motherboard choices, with Asus offering no less than 10 Z87 boards just in its “standard” line, at prices that range from ultra-budget to luxury.

Note: This review was originally featured in the October 2013 issue of the magazine.

Not everyone can afford to build their very own Dream Machine, so we also created a scaled-down version that’s half the size

A while back, we made the decision to use Corsair's towering 900D case for this year's Dream Machine, and we knew we wanted to complement it with a Build It article. When the 900D’s little bro, the Corsair 350D, arrived in our offices a few weeks later, a plan started to form. About the same time as the case arrived, we also received Nvidia's GeForce GTX 700-series cards. With those, plus a Haswell CPU already in the Lab, the plan became fully realized: We’d just make a smaller version of the Dream Machine. The 350D wouldn’t take a full-size motherboard, but we could still pack it with full-size badassery like dual Nvidia GTX 780 cards, an unlocked Intel Core i7 CPU, a primo mATX motherboard (they do exist), a jumbo radiator, and other tasty accoutrements. Our goal was to build a rig that can game to the hilt just like the Dream Machine—only scaled back so it’s easier to assemble and a lot easier on your credit line.

Note: This article was originally featured in the September 2013 issue of the magazine